politics

“Thanks to TV and for the convenience of TV, you can only be one of two kinds of human beings, either a liberal or a conservative.”

—Kurt Vonnegut, “Cold Turkey,” In These Times, May 10, 2004

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Lucy and Ethel, Justin Bieber, or the Kardashian Klan. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

Last night a reporter was working the crowd at an anti-Trump demonstration here in L.A. He came up to one young man holding a Never Trump sign.

Reporter: Did you vote?
Protester: No, on principle I did not vote.
Reporter: And what would that principle be?
Protester: That the middle-class should stand on its own.
Reporter: I see.

The reporter moved on to a young girl, clearly too young to have voted.

Reporter: So you’re against Trump?
Girl: Yes! My dad and I organized for Bernie Sanders, so we don’t like Trump!

Another protester was yelling “Never Trump!”

Reporter: Trump was legally elected. What do you think you can do about it?
Protester: I don’t know, but he can’t be allowed to take office.

Personal note: I fully support peaceful demonstrations and the people expressing their opinions. I also wish Trump hadn’t won, but he did. I’m not suggesting we “normalize” him. We have to keep fighting any draconian measures he and the Republican Congress try to enact. But I also believe in the rule of law. If we don’t uphold the law, we’re no better than the basket of deplorables who elected him. He was elected. It makes me sick to my stomach, weary to my bones, but it’s the reality we have to live with. At least I know I voted against the bastard and didn’t waste my vote. Standing on principle is cold comfort when the party in power tries to deport you or your grannie, or takes away your medical coverage, eviscerates Medicare and Social Security, appointments ultra-conservative justices to the Supreme Court whose influence will last for decades, forever and ever, Amen…

Yes, the politics of reality, realpolitik, often is not pretty. Sometimes you have to choose between the lesser of two evils. Sometimes you can joyfully and fully support a candidate, as I did Hillary Clinton. Those are the breaks. You work with what you have and if you decide to stand on an idealistic ideology with no thought of the real world, you pretty much have to live with what that principle leads you to. And, unfortunately, drags the rest of us into.

“Hating politics was like hating the weather. Pointless, since both were inevitable.”

—Eileen Wilks, Blood Magic

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

“To ‘know your place’ is a good idea in politics. That is not to say ‘stay in your place’ or ‘hang on to your place,’ because ambition or boredom may dictate upward or downward mobility, but a sense of place—a feel for one’s own position in the control room—is useful in gauging what you should try to do.”

—William Safire, Before the Fall

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

—Lyndon Baines Johnson, March 5, 1960, when declaring a break in the 150 hour filibuster by conservatives of the Civil Rights Act of 1960

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

27 JunMy friend from Mississippi lessoned me on alternate meanings of “crunching” that put a new light on “crunching numbers.” According to her, down in Pontotoc, Mississippi “crunching” is another way of saying defecating.

29 JunFrom Margo Howard: “Don’t die a virgin. Terrorists are up there waiting for you.”

WARNING: THE NEXT SECTION MAY CAUSE DISTRESS TO SENSITIVE VIEWERS:

30 JunMin left a dead mouse somewhere in the computer room but I can’t find it. How do I know it’s here? Heatwave, that’s how. Thanks, Min. I think I’m going to vacate this room for awhile. Even with all the windows open it’s not fun. Blargh. Found it. It had crawled into a collection of cloth grocery bags and a ground-level shelf of a cabinet to slough off the mortal coil. Except not really. Chlorox Clean and Nature’s Miracle and the room is barely habitable after everything was thrown out. It barely missed my Tarot card collection. That would have been an expensive throw away. I moved the Tarot card collection and anything else valuable off the lower shelves in case Min decides to release another half dead mouse in here. She was very proud of herself and when I complained about the outcome, she patiently explained her job was to catch them not dispose of them. In fairness, I interrupted her in the process and allowed semi-dead mouse to escape—which Min pointed out when I complained. A neighbor called during cleanup to invite us for the 4th and he and Mom were discussing menu items. I kept shouting, “Shut up!”

30 JunJust spent two hours on the land line with tech support for my aged, ailing Droid. Think it’s fixed long enough for my new Droid to arrive.

2 JulMaybe I didn’t survive yesterday and I’ve slipped into the Purgatory Zone.

2 JulYou may ask yourself, well, how did I get here?/Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down /Letting the days go by, water flowing underground /You may ask yourself, how do I work this?/You may ask yourself, where is that large automobile?/You may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful house /You may tell yourself, this is not my beautiful wife/Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down/ Letting the days go by, water flowing underground/Into the blue again, after the money’s gone…Same as it ever was, same as it ever was…

2 JulThe idea is not to fall into the rabbit hole even if you take things on faith.

2 JulThe greatest English queen and one of the world’s greatest monarchs couldn’t really have been a woman, but must have been a man in drag: http://dailym.ai/163pFI5

4 JulMy old Droid died for good this morning. Fortunately, I had a new Droid in hand and have (mostly) finished programming it. The 4G is so much faster than the 3G, but I think I’m inferior to it.

4 JulThe Fourth of July artillery barrage has been going on for hours now with no sign of letting up soon.

4 JulThe world is not a pure place and although it’s very colorful it favors shades of gray.

5 JulI still haven’t retrieved my contacts on the new phone. Because my old phone died the death of a thousand…deaths I couldn’t transfer them that way, and the phone wouldn’t accept my pin, tech support got stumped, so now the “Network Engineers” are working on it and I may have to wait another 24 hours or so. Because I’m an anal bunny I’ve got most of those backed up to a paper address book so I’ll be 80% okay if they can’t retrieve Ma Stuff. I like Verizon, they’ve been very good, so I’m hoping it’ll all be okay. But I’m wondering why I spent money on this Droid cover. It seems so anticlimactic.

6 JulProtip: when using Backup Assistant on your Droid remember to manually back it up periodically. Apparently just telling it to backup your contacts at the time you’re adding them is not enough. Most of my contacts are gone for good.

7 JulMin is having her first supervised walk in the backyard for months and what does she choose to hang out with? The smelly old trash cans. Stink so gud. Alas…Mom wanted to come out, too, but she got a phone call from my cousin which is lasting hours. She’s actually doing quite well these days, despite not liking stinky trash cans as much as Min.

7 JulThis phone proves over and over again that I am inferior to it. Except for the spell check. Well, it’s superior in that too, just wacky.

8 JulSpent the morning at Urgent Care with Mom. She’s okayish. Barked and ugly shin. Now I’m at work.

9 JulI need to find more money I need to find more money I need to find more money I need to find more money I need to find more money I need to…

10 JulLet’s hope the loud “DROID!” notification of new email doesn’t wake me up at 2 a.m. like it did last night. I think I changed the settings.

11 JulThe Droid was quiet as a little lamb last night but Mom’s talking clock starting screaming, “It’s 12 o’clock midnight!” over and over…at midnight. It’s a very handy gadget when the alarm function hasn’t been accidentally set. It’s atomically aligned to Greenwich or some such nonsense. It’s always right.

12 JulFor the third night running electronica conspired to disturb my sleep. First, the talking clock again shouted, “It’s 12 o’clock midnight!” I unplugged it and took the batteries out just to be safe. I noticed before doing so that the alarm icon was still showing on the face. I shall attempt to fix that when I’m actually awake. Sometimes the functions on this thing are easy to figure out, sometimes not, and of course Mom doesn’t know where the instructions are. But sight-impaired Mom won’t go without her talking clock. I hooked up the spare one for her this morning.

The second electronica whim-whammery came when the Droid again screamed “DROID!” in the wee hours. I was too tired to care, turned over, and went back to sleep. I guess I didn’t get those settings right after all. I may have to admit defeat and call Support.

“A promising young man should go into politics so that he can go on promising for the rest of his life.”

—attributed to Robert Byrne

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.